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British Football News: Guernsey Football

Sink or Swim? Andy Greeves on football's struggle to stay afloat on Guernsey.

With just seven teams in its top division and no promotion or relegation between its leagues, over-familiarity is an issue which threatens the very future of football on Guernsey.

The Channel Island, which falls under the remit of the British crown but which is not part of the UK, is affiliated with neither UEFA or FIFA, meaning the game's stagnation continues at international level. Select players from Guernsey must be content with an annual clashes with Jersey for the Morratti Trophy and a bi-annual trip to the Island Games, featuring such footballing heavyweights as Rhodes, Anglesey, Minorca and Gibraltar.

Guernsey didn't even send a team to the 2007 Island Games, due to health concerns over the heat in Rhodes and are now they are struggling to raise the £40,000 needed to have a football representative at this year's competition in Aland (an autonomous province of Finland). It's hardly surprising, given the lack of competition and exposure, that there's not one footballer from Guernsey currently playing professionally in the UK. A similar problem exists on Jersey, who only has one playing representatives in the Football League at the present - Brett Pitman of AFC Bournemouth.

It's all a far cry from less a decade ago when Matt Le Tissier and Graham Le Saux flew the flag for their respective islands, playing in the Premier League and netting a total of 44 England caps between them.

As Guernsey's top two sides, Belgrave Wanderers and Northerners AC (or 'Bels' and 'North' as they are known to the locals) locked horns in March to decide the destination of the Senior Division One trophy, the problems facing football on Guernsey were all too apparent. "We'd generally get about 1000 supporters for a title decider here," says one Bels fan, "but the game clashes with Liverpool and Chelsea Champions League fixtures, so we'll be lucky to get 400 here tonight". Looking around Belgrave's home ground 'The Track', so-called because of the go-kart track which runs round the pitch, a crowd estimate of 400 looks about right. There's a good number more people in nearby pubs, watching Gerrard, Torres, Lampard, Drogba et al in action.

Gareth Le Prevost, deputy-editor of The Guernsey Press is concerned at the impact television is having on local football on the island. "Since the advent of satellite TV and other lifestyle changes, the local games are not as well attended as some would like them to be and certainly not as well as they were in the past. When I first started writing for The Guernsey Press, I wondered if anyone was interested anymore because some of the crowds at games were so small."

In league and cup last year, Belgrave Wanderers and Northerners AC met a total of 10 times and given their domination this season, the two sides are likely to meet a similar number of times throughout 2009. The stagnation is taking its toll on the quality of football on Guernsey according to Le Prevost. "There are some very talented players within our first division, considering that they are all purely amateur," he says - a statement clearly backed up watching the Bels v North game. "However, because of the habitual problem of stagnation and playing against familiar faces week in, week out, I have found that many of our best players have hit their peak by their early 20s and do not improve beyond that," adds Le Prevost.

Guernsey's beleaguered league has taken a further blow recently with the news that Cable & Wireless, the league's title sponsor for the past five season's, will not be renewing its commercial partnership with the local football association next campaign. The communications giant had invested over £100k in the league during its period of sponsorship, which will hit the game hard on Guernsey if another backer cannot be found soon. There are genuine fears that the top division might lose some of its teams as a result of the sponsorship collapse, with the prospect of the league kicking off in the summer with only five or six teams to compete for the championship a real one.

Despite the apparent doom and gloom surrounding Guernsey's football, the Guernsey Football Association (GFA) remains upbeat about the game's future here and hopes to find the 'next Matthew Le Tissier' through a Centre of Excellence at St Sampson's Secondary School, which was set up in January. Southampton, Portsmouth and AFC Bournemouth have all agreed to run training sessions for youngsters at U12, U13 and U14 levels, with these programmes being extended to other age groups if the GFA can secure funding. The venture increases the likelihood of talent been spotted on the island too, which seems to have been sadly over looked, or simply not there for the last ten years or so.

Tempting youngsters to these training sessions may be a problem in itself, given the lack of opportunity the football would appear to offer children on Guernsey at present, especially in comparison with other sport. "Having been the main sport for so many years, football is playing catch up with others in Guernsey now," believes Le Prevost.

"Guernsey youngsters and senior sportsmen/women alike can travel the world if they are good at sports such as cricket and table tennis - it gives them a real incentive to improve and concentrate on those activities.

A small community has only so many participants to go around the sports and if someone is talented at football and table tennis as a kid for example, they will probably chose to go down the table tennis path. That is a sport which offers a Guernsey kids a chance to compete in places such as China and Australia rather than football, which is still almost exclusively domestic at all levels."

Just a few years ago, Guernsey had talked seriously about becoming a member of FIFA, dreaming of annual funding and international matches against the likes of England and France. The mission for football there nowadays is simply one of survival.

Andy Greeves

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